Albert Pike

Pike, Albert, 1809–91, American lawyer, Confederate general in the Civil War, b. Boston. He settled (1832) in Arkansas, where he became a newspaper editor and a lawyer. He was a captain in the Mexican War. In the Civil War, Pike secured for the Confederacy the loyalty of the tribes in the Indian Territory. Criticized for inept handling of his Native American brigade, especially at the battle of Pea Ridge (Mar., 1862), he resigned. After the war he practiced law in Memphis and Washington. His Prose Sketches and Poems Written in the Western Country (1834) resulted from a trip over the Santa Fe Trail. A prominent Freemason (he joined the order in 1850), his writings on the movement include Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry (1871).